I love ER, I really do. It's one of my favorite shows ever. But its in a two year contract with NBC right now and a lot of people don't think it will make it past this coming season. I don't know about that, but I can see why people would think so.

The fact is, the show is hemmoraging cast!

Sure, it sucked when Ross and Hathaway left. Sure it was a blow when Benton left and an even bigger blow when Greene died. But at least the ER still had a pretty full staff to keep things going. But...

November 2003: Romano dies.
Spring 2004: Gallant goes to Iraq.
04-05 season: Korday, Chen, AND Carter all left for one reason or another.
2005 offseason: Now Lewis won't be back either!

Do you know what this means? Not only did the ER loose it's chief, THREE attendings, and TWO of its chief surgeons in the span of less than a year, but the remaining ER staff will look something like this...

One Chief Of Staff: Weaver
NO Chief Of ER: ?
ONE Attending: Kovac
ONE Surgeon: Dubenko
Five Residents, two of whom are barely out of med school, one of whom just stopped being a nurse five minutes ago, and a chief resident who is a total joke: Pratt, Neela, Barnett, Abby, Morris
ONE major-character Nurse: Sam

I think the TPTB already wanted to get a 'name' to replace Carter, and now that Lewis is gone, they're gonna need to get TWO grown-ups if they want any success. And there need to be more attendings unless they're going to make Luka work until he's dead. At MINIMUM, a new ER chief/attending grown-up is needed.

I am VERY interested to see how TPTB handle this unprecedented loss of cast/staff.

I am by no means an ER addict (I've only seen 2 episodes in my whole life) but can I just hijack this thread for a second to bitch about Neela? The two things that really bug me about her:

1. Her accent. Are you posh or common as muck? Make your mind up because the way you spend most of the episode speaking in plummy tones before reverting to 'working class roots' mode whenever you experience emotional trauma I found really grating.

2. The one episode I saw with Neela in she had to comfort a grieving relative who was slightly hysterical. She constantly tried to get the woman's focus by saying "Ma'am, If you'd just come over here, Ma'am". When was the last time you heard a Brit use the word 'Ma'am' to address a member of the great unwashed (aka the general public )?? I know it's the more common term of address in the USA but if Neela is British she would almost certainly have called her 'Madam', particularly if she was under pressure as no doubt she'd revert back to what she was used to.

Now I know it's just a TV show and I know it's not supposed to be 100% accurate but would it have really killed an actress of her talent to say to the director or whoever, "Actually, I don't think I would say/do that. I think I'd say/do this instead."

He was a great character. You hated him, but he had depth, you know? He just wasn't a jerk and that was it.

That episode was the last one I watched. Did the writers think they were being funny, having him crushed by a falling helicopter after already losing an arm to one?

How insulting.

IMO... he was one of the more realistic characters on the show. Run into docs like that too many times myself.

I can remember being horrified when ER was still fairly new, and I was still a fairly new nurse. I used to joke around saying "I'll NEVER work in that ER, but I bet the nurses get a ton of overtime". Every other day, there was some sort of MAJOR disaster. If it wasnt the weather, someone was blowing something up , or a doctor was getting knifed by a patient!

I watched every single episode of ER religiously until 2 seasons ago. I think it was when Carter left Chicago for a while and he found out his girlfriend was pregnant. That's about all I remember. I just got bored with it I can't believe the show is still on!